Indian academic 'disappointed' in Australia's carbon policy shift

A leading Indian voice on climate change says he's disappointed in the Australian Government's plans to repeal its carbon pricing legislation.

Dr Prodipto Ghosh is a Distinguished Fellow at the Energy and Resources Institute in New Delhi, and the principal author of India's national climate change action plan.

Dr Ghosh is on a number of climate change government, business and industry environment groups, and is a keen observer of global environmental policies.

Australian Parliament is sitting this week for the first time since the Coalition won government in September.

The Coalition this week plans to introduce a number of bills to repeal the former Labor Government's carbon trading scheme into the House of Representatives.

It's a move being watched by Dr Ghosh in India.

"We are disappointed to see that the present government is now seeking to repeal its climate change legislation," Dr Ghosh told Radio Australia.

"We certainly hope that Australia would come around to understanding at a policy level and a regulatory level that climate change would affect Australia as much as it would affect any other country, possibly more because Australia is a country which is very dependent on its natural resources, and that Australia must do its fair share of international burden sharing.

"On the positive side, Australia has developed some excellent technologies for clean energy, for example concentrated solar electricity generation systems and we hope that these are more widely deployed in Australia itself and also that there is international cooperation in the transfer of this technology to India.

"In some of these technologies we feel that there is scope for a great deal of collaboration between Australia and India."

Targets for big polluters

Dr Ghosh says India has a scheme to that sets efficiency targets for the country's biggest polluters.

"It depends on the (company's) particular technologies and the particular resources they use, and they have to accomplish this in three years.

"So the regulatory agency will measure their energy efficiency at the beginning of the three years and at the end of the three years and in between they have to take various steps to reduce their energy use per unit of output.

"If they fail to meet their targets, then they face a financial penalty.

"But if they over-perform on their targets they get certificates which they can trade with other companies which are not able to realise their targets, so it is a trading scheme similar to a carbon trading scheme, having a similar affect on carbon emissions but premised on energy efficiency rather than on C02 emissions."

Environmental challenge

"This includes water, this includes air quality, this includes soil, this includes biodiversity and coastal resources," said Dr Ghosh.

"I think there is the acceptance of the reality of climate change at both the popular level and the policy level.

"India has never actually questioned the scientific findings and the consensus of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change).

"However it's a different story that when one moves from accepting the reality of climate change to working out an international burden sharing arrangement, the question of fairness comes up very, very strongly.

"So India is certainly not a denier on climate change, it is simply seeking the environmental space which it believes is fair for all countries in the world."

Amy Bainbridge is one of 25 journalists from around the world awarded an Asia-Europe Foundation travel bursary to attend the conference discussing sustainability and the environment. ASEF is an intergovernmental, non-profit organisation.